


To Repair With Gold

by imbellarosa



Series: The Kintsukuroi Anthology [1]
Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Ben Solo Deserved Better, Force Bond (Star Wars), Multi, Post-Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, Rey deserved better, They all deserved better, Tros fix-it, also the Generals Dameron, resurrection - ish style thing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-13
Updated: 2020-01-13
Packaged: 2021-02-19 08:49:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,865
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22241776
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/imbellarosa/pseuds/imbellarosa
Summary: “There’s this - this entire galaxy full of lonely and lost children who feel the pull of the dark side,” she says, “and we can’t send a message saying that they are evil and alone. Violence begets violence. We have to do better. For the living, and the dead.”The war is over, but that's only half of the story. We all have to go home, at some point, if we have one. And we must create one if we do not.
Relationships: Poe Dameron/Finn, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren, but all in the background, if you squint
Series: The Kintsukuroi Anthology [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1600984
Comments: 5
Kudos: 30





	To Repair With Gold

**Author's Note:**

> It's been so long since last we met! First, a HUGE thanks to Sarah and Ora who are always my first two readers and amazing friends who put up with my writing whims?? Like wow I love them. 
> 
> Which leads me to: I HATED TROS. I just did. And so I fixed it. And before we get into the story, I want to say that in this universe, POE IS NOT A DRUG DEALER. If JJ Abrams can retcon things with one line, so can I! I am also not a die hard fan of the original trilogy/prequel trilogy (though damned if they aren't more cohesive stories) and I LOVED TLJ. This means that my perspective coming into this is that all the characters are really flawed and have made terrible mistakes, and I want to explore that because it makes them interesting - it makes them human.
> 
> I also really think that Star Wars fails when it ostracizes struggling kids and allows adults to cast them aside as if that's the right answer. It's not. If you are feeling alone, here are some resources you can call/text:
> 
> The National Child Abuse hotline: 1-800-422-4453  
> The National Suicide Prevention hotline: 1-800-273-8255  
> The Trevor Project: 1-866-488-7386  
> Y para ayuda en espanol, visite la sita para los varios numeros de telefono para llamar: https://www.lafamiliacounseling.org/get_help_now

> _"'The time has come,' the Walrus said,_
> 
> _To talk of many things:_
> 
> _Of shoes — and ships — and sealing-wax —_
> 
> _Of cabbages — and kings —_
> 
> _And why the sea is boiling hot —_
> 
> _And whether pigs have wings.'"_
> 
> _\- Lewis Carroll_
> 
> * * *

He feels like he’s treading water at first. Like he closed his eyes for a nap and woke up somewhere completely different. It isn’t an unfamiliar feeling. He would get it when he was younger, sometimes, after having dreams. They were odd, his dreams. He would dream of men with mottled faces and scratchy voices calling out to him, calling him by names that were not his own.

_ I’m scared _ , he would tell his mother, sobbing into her sleeve.

_ There’s nothing to be scared of _ , she would say, her voice trembling and hitching on the word ‘scared’. His father would be standing in the doorway, his eyes narrowed, looking at him as if he were about to explode. 

Later, he would hear them talking in whispers, in sentences he didn’t understand then.

_ But what if _ , his father would say,  _ you never know. He has so much strength already, and you know what Luke said _ .

_ He’s  _ our son _ , Han _ , his mother would say, but she would never sound sure of herself,  _ it’s up to us to make this different. _

_ What if there  _ is no _ different,  _ his father would shout, and he would know that he was something to be scared of.

_ No, _ the voice he heard in his dreams would tell him, deep and breathy and somehow familiar,  _ you are strong. And the weak will always fear strength _ .

Later, when he was older, he would think that this was the first time he heard this voice outside of his dreams. But he was young then, and he screamed and screamed and screamed. His parents sent him away the following week.

_ You’re going to live with your uncle, _ his mother told him. _ He’s going to help you _ .

_ But I want to live  _ here, he remembered his lower lip trembling.  _ I’m sorry. I won’t tell you about my dreams anymore _ . 

_ No, _ his father had said, crouching to meet his eyes,  _ No, kid, it’s not that it’s just. This family has a long history of people who didn’t make the best choices with the gifts they’d been given. We want you to make good choices, and Uncle Luke’s going to help you with that _ .

_ That’s right _ , his mother had agreed,  _ we’ve told you about his school. He helps people. Trains them to be Jedis, like him and his father before him. _

_ Leia, _ his father had cut her off. She had looked up at his father in a worried way, and then turned back to him, placing her hands to his cheeks.

_ We love you, you know, _ she had said softly,  _ and we’ll visit as often as we can. And besides, you’ll be back before you know it.  _

_ Promise _ , he had said, and in his memories his voice sounds so small and high and  _ weak _ . 

_ I promise,  _ she had said, and kissed his cheek and escorted him to the small ship waiting to take him to his uncle’s school.

He had watched them until they had been specks on the ground and disappeared. They would never see their son again. 

Later, he would think that it was their choice, their fault. But at six, ten, thirteen years old, he learned that the only person he could count on was himself. Well, that and the voices in his head. 

They got louder, through the years. Of course they did. There was never anyone or anything that would shout them down. His parents were heroes - his uncle was a hero. That’s what everyone said. And who was he? A scared, skinny little boy with too much magic who no one trusted or loved or even wanted.

_ They’re coming _ , he told the voice in his head.  _ Snoke _ , it had said once. 

_ So where are they, _ Snoke had replied, and he sounded pitying, and so old.

Luke’s school was on a lush, green island surrounded by more water than he had ever seen in his life. He imagines, sometimes, taking a ship and sailing and sailing until he reaches the edge of the planet, and never being found again. Living like Yoda, alone in his swamp with his books and his ghosts and nothing to be scared of and no one to scare.

_ Is that what you want _ , Snoke asks him, _ a life as a hermit? No power, no strength, no one to know you or remember you? I could give you a better life.  _

He thinks about it. And then he thinks about it some more. Luke sees him thinking about it, he can tell. He thinks about it and looks to the horizon for the parents that promised to come back to him and find him. He thinks about it and he walks down by the rocks, down by the ocean crashing on them, and he thinks about what love might feel like.

_ Like fear _ , Snoke whispers,  _ like how the tides fear the rocks and the rocks fear the tides, both locked in their inevitability _ .

_ What does that word mean _ , he had asked, still young despite knowing so much. 

_ You’ll find out, _ the voice had been warm, almost. The hair on the back of his neck had prickled. 

In the end, his choice had been easy. Snoke had been right - Luke had been waiting for the right moment to turn on him, to kill him. But by that time, he was too strong, and he knew too much. They would pay the price for their betrayal.  _ And their neglect _ , another voice in his head told him, but it wasn’t Snokes. It was smaller, angrier,  _ and all of their broken promises _ . 

And now he’s here, treading water on the beach where he had made his stand so many years ago. 

“Hey, kid,” Luke tells him, holding his hand out. He takes it, hesitantly, and it feels solid and strong and warm as it pulls him out of the ocean. “Told you I’d see you around.”

“Luke,” he says, his voice still hesitant. It feels so young, it feels so old. “What am I doing here?”

“Well,” he says, and sits down on a rock. “We’re gonna have a conversation, and then you’re going to make a choice.”

“Am I a ghost?” he looks down at himself, at his hands, which had been filled with scars, and were now clean and smooth. 

“Yeah,” Luke laughs. “You kind of are. But you’re also half of a whole - did you know that?”

“You taught it to us,” he says. “Once. You taught us about Force Dyads. But you said they were fairy tales, that they weren’t real.”

“Eh,” his uncle shrugs, “what did I know? They used to say the same thing about the Jedis.” 

“There’s only one left,” he says. “She’s all we’ve got.”

“Let’s walk,” Luke says and motions to the top of the cliff.

Ben stands up, and he can still feel the sand between his toes, he can feel the wetness of his clothes against his own skin. 

“What were you going to do next,” Luke asks, his hands clasped behind his back, steadily not looking at him.

“What,” Ben mimics his old teacher’s stance, and looks at him.

“If you had lived,” Luke clarifies. “What were you going to do with the rest of your life?”

“I was -,” he breaks off and looks away from him. “I was going to be better. I was going to fix as much as I could of all I had done, and I was going to disappear. I was going to end the cycle of fear and betrayal and hurt. I was going to change our legacy.”

“And what is our legacy, Ben?” his eyes are piercing, and they seem to scorch him. 

“It’s one of pain,” Ben answers, not backing down. “Of fear and lies and anguish and war and so much death. I was a child when my parents sent me away. I was a child when you turned on me. And I was so alone and so afraid and Snoke was the only one that offered any answers.”

“You made your own choices,” Luke tells him, looking off into the horizon.

“I did,” he agrees, and he thinks about how once he would have raised his voice or razed this island to the ground, and he knows how young he was, even just a year ago. “I made my choices. But no one ever fought for me. _ You _ never fought for me. My parents - they didn’t even come to see me!”

He’s starting to get agitated, so he takes a deep breath, readjusts his stance, and starts again, more quietly, “You know, I always thought that they were going to come back for me, right up until that night I woke to you holding a saber over my head.” 

“I know,” he says, and he hangs his head, looking ashamed for the first time in their conversation. “But you aren’t the only one who knows what that feels like. Rey - she counted all of the turns of the sun she could.”

“And then she left,” Ben agrees. 

The walk for a while, the sun on their backs and the wind weaving its way through Ben’s hair. It is longer now than it had been the last time he had been on this island. 

“I have a theory,” he says, eventually. “And you should tell me if I’m wrong.”

Luke nods, as if telling him to go on.

“Rey isn’t actually a Palpatine. She isn’t actually anything except what you needed her to be in this odd, intergalactic space saga that we could never really finish. She was a pawn, like I was.”

“I think that’s why the Force linked you,” Luke agrees without really admitting to anything. “Two souls so powerful in the Force with circumstances that were so similar. One drawn to the dark and the other to the light. Sometimes, that may be enough to make history. One would certainly like to think so.”

“And you’re just going to go on letting her believe that she’s a Palpatine?”

“The truth will come out when it matters most.”

“Oh come on,” he bites out, and then breathes, reminding himself that he’s meant to be calm - that this is meant to be different. “What if you just -  _ for once  _ \- tell the truth just because - just because it’s the truth. Not when you want it to be or when it would benefit you, but just because.”

“A powerful weapon, the truth is,” Luke glances at him sideways and smirks a bit. “And it must be used sparingly.”

“No,” Ben says, and it’s firm and the air around them changes. “Enough lies. Enough halfs truths. Things have to be different from now on. They  _ will  _ be different.” 

“And what are you going to do about it,” Luke turns to face him, bringing his hands in front of him. 

“I’m - I’m going to find her. I’m going to tell her. She carries all of the Jedi, right? Well, I was a Jedi, too.”

He feels small. He could be sixteen again - clumsy, making a costume out of who he wanted to be. 

“Do you think so?”

“I,” he looks out and sighs. “I don’t know. I used to want to be. I wanted to be just like you, when I was a kid. I knew that my parents were heroes - that you were a legend, and I just. I wanted to make you all proud.

“And you know what? It’s not fair that you all disappointed me. And for all that I have done, you left a child alone, with nowhere to turn except for the dark in his own head, and you made him feel like an outsider for it. That child  _ deserved _ better. _ I _ deserved better. And Rey deserves better, too.”

They stand in silence, looking at the sun setting over the long horizon. Ben thinks that this might be a beautiful painting, or the sort of place he would have wanted to retire to, if one retired from an evil intergalactic army. 

“Maybe you’re right. Can I just ask - what would changing our legacy have looked like,” Luke turns and looks right at him, before repeating his question. “Ben. What were you going to do with the rest of your life?”

“I would have helped,” he says, then shrugs. “Or, tried to. I would have looked for children who were hurting and tried to find a way to ease their pain. I would have tried to stop people from using them as pawns in a game larger than they could understand.

“And then,” he takes a deep breath and looks out at the cliffs and the Porgs walking around the island and the waves crashing on the rocks and he thinks about that all important question:  _ What is love _ ? He thinks he would have liked to find out. “And then I would have left. Like you did, only not because of shame. I would have liked to lead a quiet life - to. To have a family and tell my children that I was proud of them. I would have liked for my name - your name - to mean something aside from the legends. Legends always cause pain to those that stand in the aftermath, anyways.” 

“You have this all planned out, huh,” Luke looks at him and Ben can see the kid from the stories for the first time in his whole life - er, death. He can see the boy who wanted a bright future, and who wanted to believe in the good in everyone, and he thinks,  _ where were you when I needed you? _

He takes a deep breath.

“I’m sorry,” he says. “I’m sorry that the world failed you, and that you thought that your only option was to kill me. I’m sorry that there was a point in my life when that  _ was  _ your only option. I’m sorry that I wasn’t better until it was too late, and I’m sorry that I didn’t get a chance to make it better with everyone else.

“I’m” - he breaks off and his voice breaks - “I’m sorry that I didn’t see my mom again. At the same time, that was her choice, you know? I. I didn’t want  _ Princess Leia Organa _ or  _ the General _ . I just wanted my mom, and I just wanted her to love me, and when she didn’t it was - I don’t know. It was like the choice had been made for me already. I just had to be strong enough to accept it.”

He wipes his eyes and takes a deep breath, “I guess I just thought that when she didn’t love me, no one could, and joining Snoke was the best way to get anyone to  _ listen _ to me. I just wanted someone to listen.”

His uncle looks at him as though he is seeing something for the first time. As if he’s understanding something for the first time. 

“War makes monsters of us all,” he says, and he sounds older than he had ever sounded in life, even at the end of it. 

“That’s not good enough.” Ben thinks that maybe this is who he would have been, if he had lived, if he had stayed. Maybe he would have been a little scarred, and a little scared, and strong enough to use his words instead of the Force. “I deserved an explanation. I deserved for you to tell me what was so scary about a little boy with bad dreams. I deserved to know that you had dreams, too, and that all of your nightmares had already come to pass. You  _ owed  _ me that.”

“We did what we thought was best. Always.” 

“Well, it wasn’t good enough.”

“Okay, kid,” he agrees and looks at him and gives him a small, sad smile. “So what now?”

* * *

It is a cool day on the unknown planet that the Resistance had chosen as the headquarters for the New Order - whatever that was meant to be. It couldn’t be a Republic anymore - that had rosen and failed - nor could it be a monarchy - the last royal was dead. The only thing they had left were two men who had lead a final battle for the ages and the woman who had shot light out of her fingertips. 

“So,” Finn says in their first meeting as a pseudo-triumvirate. “What now?”

“We - we could establish a Parliament,” Rey suggests hesitantly. “I’ve been reading about old governments, and the ones that lasted the longest usually had some input from the people. Did you know there are entire worlds and empires based around the idea of the ‘consent of the governed’? It’s fascinating, I’d have never  _ imagined _ -”

“Rey,” Poe cuts her off impatiently. “Let’s focus.” 

“Right, sorry,” she nods, then squirms, “but just - okay, just  _ consider _ . I mean, think about all of the people that convinced us to do the right thing: Rose, Admiral Holdo, Jannah, even -”

She breaks off and looks away.

“All I’m saying is that the voices of others always made us  _ stronger _ . We can’t discard that, or forget it.”

“We won’t,” Finn promises, and Poe nods vehemently. “But we have to figure out  _ how  _ to incorporate the most voices in the fairest manner while figuring out how to rehabilitate a splintered galaxy.”

“He’s right,” Poe interrupts, then balks at himself. “Sorry, I’m trying to do better but. Think about all of the planets that have been left in ruins. And think of all of the stormtroopers that are in disarray. Think about all the children that have been orphaned. And somehow  _ we  _ have to be the ones that fix it.”

He narrows his eyes and fixes his laser stare on Rey.

“And I’m not Force Sensitive, like the two of you, but I have pretty good instincts. I know that something happened on Tatooine, when you went to bury those sabers. And something tells me that you’re not planning on staying with us for very long.” 

She looks down.

“Rey, what,” Finn looks between them. “What’s he talking about?”

“I was  _ going  _ to tell you,” she says, and looks at Finn, “both of you. It isn’t that I don’t want to stay - it’s just. I  _ can’t  _ stay. The Jedi ways have been lost, and there are  _ so many  _ Force Sensitive individuals out there that  _ must  _ be trained. People like you, who could make  _ such  _ a difference if they wanted to. They would keep the balance in the Force. Because without that balance, there would only ever be more war.”

“I’m not leaving,” Finn says,moves closer to Poe, and grabs his hand.  _ The Generals Dameron, _ she thinks. “I don’t care about the magical powers that make things float or make you hear voices or tells you what you’re supposed to do. I mean - I appreciate them and all, but I’m needed  _ here _ . And so are you.”

“You can’t run away from this,” Poe says, and stares at her with the look that inspired hope in thousands of men and women across the galaxy, “That never ends well. Look at Luke: he ran, this happened. We’re all scared. But we’re in this together. The generals and the Jedi. We’re going to build a future that we can  _ all _ live in. And Rey, that’s - that’s balance.” 

“I -,” she can feel the lump in her throat, and she thinks about that cave, and the cavern within it, and she thinks that for the first time in her entire existence, she might well and truly be alone. “I won’t leave right away. But someone has to look for the children that possess things that they do not understand - that have a Force living inside of them. We  _ cannot  _ allow them to feel alone. We must lead them, too.

“Besides,” she looks at them and their intertwined hands between them and manages a small smile, “both worlds live in both of you. And you know what it means to lead, to create. I’m just - I’m just Rey. A scavenger from Jakku who, for whatever reason, was tapped for this amazing responsibility and I must rise to meet it. But I’m no leader.”

“I don’t believe that,” Finn says, and he reaches out and grabs her hand, too. “You’re the best of us, Rey.”

“Rey,” Poe looks at her, and she sees that he understands something, and she doesn’t know what it is. “We want you here. With us. Whether you lead or whether you seek and find and teach. This is your home, and we are your family. There is - and will always be - a place at our table for you.”

She laughs a watery laugh, and throws herself at him. He hugs her tightly, and wonders what she has lost that they have not. There is something new about her now. Something unbearably old and tragic.

“She chose you, you know,” Rey whispers in his ear. “Leia did. She knew you would be the one to lead us into a new age. You and Finn both.”

“She chose you, too,” Poe says, and pulls back and smiles gently. “And right now, we need you. Help us, Rey. You’re our only hope.”

He’s older than she is, and she’s never felt that so acutely as she does when he wipes her tears, squeezes her hands, and lets her go. Finn is right behind her, and replaces Poe’s hand in hers, and they turn back to the table with all of the maps and facts and figures that represent people, out there, somewhere, waiting for the world to be better than it has been. 

* * *

“You  _ have to concentrate _ ,” Luke grits out, raising his voice to be heard over the water crashing on the beach.

“What do you think I’m doing,” Ben calls back, and there’s something younger about him. Lighter.

“Come on, again,” Luke readjusts himself on the rock he’s chosen to float above. “Focus on the silence within you. On the water and the sky and the life under the ocean floor and above the stars. And feel yourself - your own life force amongst it all.”

He breathes, in and out and in. He looks in, or tries to, and finds that, for the first time in his whole life, he is alone in his own head, and the demons that live there are his own. He could laugh. He could cry. He does not. He looks deeper, searches for life on the island, for the heat of the sun and the crawl of the critters that live under his feet. He searches for a cycle that is not one of death and destruction. 

He searches for proof that no end is really an end. He searches for a million sparkling stars in the heavens and the planets that orbit about them. He searches for life on those planets and tries to mimic their pulses. He tries to imagine his place with them - not larger, not smaller. Just. There. Just alive, and a part of all things living and dying, because those words are synonyms when you wait long enough. 

“Good,” his uncle calls, and it sounds like he’s laughing, “Ben! Good! Keep going!”

He goes on. He looks for those like him, and he finds so many of them - so many children who are alone and unloved and scared that the galaxy is both too large and too small for them. He tries to send out a thought, a prayer, a promise. But there are so many of them, and he is so weak. He cannot stay long.

“Ben,” he hears his uncle say again, but he seems so far away, and he is treading water again. “Ben! You need an anchor - something to tether yourself. Come back.  _ Come back! _ ”

But he is so far away and he was meant to be looking for something and he’s  _ so close _ he can feel it, and then - the sun. His uncle’s face in front of him, eyes wide, worried.

“What happened,” he manages to murmur.

“You almost faded,” Luke sighs. “We don’t know how long it would take for you to rematerialize if you faded again. Come on, Ben. We’ve talked about this. You need to anchor yourself. The universe is too big for you to just - wander.”

“I know,” he says, frustrated. “I  _ know _ \- it’s just. There’s so much out there. So many people. I never knew there was so much to everything.” 

Luke smiles - that small, mystic smile that he had only ever seen through Rey’s eyes and it’s now directed at him. 

“It’s sort of overwhelming, isn’t it,” Luke says, then shrugs and shoots straight back up. “Well, it wasn’t a complete failure. Look behind you.”

There, in the soft mud where he had been standing, were two deep footprints. 

* * *

“What about those who are left,” Rey says at the end of another long, frustrating meeting in which there are too many problems and not enough solutions. 

“What do you mean,” Poe asks her, running his hand through his hair. 

“The people who’ve been brainwashed and victimized and forced to fight a battle they didn’t believe in! We can’t call them all war criminals - look at Finn!” 

“Hey, I defected,” Finn protests loudly, then slumps his shoulders. “But Rey’s right. We can’t condemn them all as war criminals. That wouldn’t be fair - a lot of them were brainwashed.”

“Okay,” Poe agrees, nodding, then pulling up what can be best described as a holo-whiteboard. “A rehabilitation program of sorts. I like that. We can do that.” 

“And I think we should start it on the most damaged planets,” Rey bursts in quickly, as if she can’t contain herself.

Finn’s eyes, which have looked weary and exhausted for the past few days, immediately brighten and flit between Rey and Poe. 

“Yes,” he says passionately, “That’s perfect. We can rehabilitate storm troopers - or any participants of the First Order’s troops- by forcing them to rehabilitate the planets and people that they have hurt.” 

“Okay,” Poe says slowly, ever the tactician, “how about the ones that were willing participants? We can’t just - let them go?”

“We can designate a few planets specifically for those prisoners,” Rey says, “and we can keep watch with Resistance troops - former Resistance troops - New Order troops - oh, whoever we are now. We can place people there to run as a sort of - a sort of halfway house. I was reading about that, too, you know? The idea that rehabilitation works as a better preventative measure than incarceration or execution -”

“Most of their leaders are dead, anyways,” Finn shrugs. “We have a few generals, maybe. But Pride, Hux, Snoke and Ren - they’re all gone. Not like we could have executed them, anyway.”

For the first time in the entire conversation, Rey falters, and turns away. Poe thinks that he sees tears in her eyes. Something in this entire story doesn’t make sense, and he can’t quite place it, and he  _ knows _ that BB8 knows, but she’s not saying anything, either. And then Rey turns back to them and her eyes are fierce.

“There will be  _ no  _ execution,” she says, and the air around her changes, crackles with power and electricity. “That  _ cannot _ be our legacy. We  _ have  _ to be better than those who came before us.”

“Rey,” Poe says quietly. He’s never been afraid of her, and he certainly isn’t now, but he’s a soldier, and he’s wary of one person with that much power.

“ _ No _ ,” she all but snarls, “Luke, Leia, Han, Annakin - they  _ all failed _ .  _ The same man _ caused another generation of Jedi to be splintered and brought disarray to the galaxy  _ again _ , and they didn’t see it until it was too late. They were  _ so scared _ of the dark side of the Force that they considered violence the only way to deal with it - but that’s not balance. That’s just - just light. And light can’t exist without darkness. To try would be like - like a part of you is missing. Like you didn’t know that there was this - this whole other side of you, and then it’s gone and you  _ don’t know how to get it back _ and it’s  _ too late _ .”

“Rey,” Finn reaches for her, but she backs away, and she’s crying now, and it strikes them that, in this entire aftermath, neither of them have really seen her cry. It is jarring to them, because she has been so steady until this moment. But she’s shaking like a leaf, and practically spitting in rage, and they genuinely don’t know who she’s angry at. 

“There’s this - this entire galaxy full of lonely and lost children who feel the pull of the dark side,” she says, “and we can’t send a message saying that they are evil and alone. Violence begets violence. We have to  _ do better _ . For the living, and the dead.” 

“Okay,” Poe says, softly, and he looks like he wants to say a million other things, but he bites his tongue. Just this once. 

“How about this planet system,” he says, and pulls out a holomap, pointing to a small cluster of planets that had been some of the first casualties of the war. “We have a base in the next star system, and we can send pilots out, and it’s far away enough that if anything were to go wrong, it would be isolated damage.”

“That’s - that’s perfect,” Rey sniffs and looks at Poe. He meets her eyes and nods. They no longer need any words.

* * *

Ben thinks that he might be stuck here - in this state, on this island - forever until he hears something. Or, not hears - feels, maybe, is the best word. There is a shift in the Force, caused by words, but he can’t really tell what it is that has gotten through to him.  _ Violence begets violence _ , the voice says - _ her _ voice.  _ We have to do better. For the living, and the dead _ . He immediately looks at Luke. 

“Did you feel that,” he says. His old master has an awed look on his face - it is one of complete peace.

“Balance,” Luke breathes the word out, as if he can’t quite believe it. “It feels like balance.”

“Yes, but,” he reminds himself silently to be less impatient, more wise. “There were - I heard her. She - she caused this.”

“I heard nothing,” Luke says, “except the ocean below and the sky above and the way they seemed to hum in the harmony of a better world.”

“I have to find her,” Ben insists, and looks up at Luke, “let’s try again. I can do it this time. I know I can.”

Luke looks off into the horizon and raises his head, as if he’s listening for something. Whatever it is, he must find it, because he turns to face him, and his face splits into an enormous grin, and Ben feels like the child his uncle must’ve once loved.

“Wait,” he says, and looks at Luke before they try again. “If this works - I don’t know if I’m going to see you again. No one has ever done anything like this before - what if. What if I lose my connection with the Force?”

“Will what you have gained be worth it,” Luke asks, his eyes glinting like they do when he knows the answer. He laughs and plays along anyways. It might be his last chance.

“If I could go back,” he says in a low baritone - a man’s voice, not a child’s, “not just to her, but to them, to make this right - that’s worth everything. No matter what.”

“Then you know what must be done,” his uncle says, and tries to touch his face. “And you have the strength to do it.

“Besides,” Luke continues, “the Force is that which connects everything living and dead - it is in all of us, whether we can sense it or not. Even if you can no longer sense it, you will never lose your connection it - because you are a part of it, as it is a part of you.” 

Ben holds his uncle’s eyes, and nods.

“Next time you see my mother,” he says, “tell her I love her. Tell her that I miss her, and that I’m sorry that even now she could not see me. Tell her that I understand because I have known that fear. Tell her that I love her, and that I’m going to make it right. Promise?”

“I promise,” Luke swears solemnly, an uncle’s last gift.

Then Ben closes his eyes again, and imagines the galaxy. It is in complete disarray; ravaged by years of turmoil and war and imbalance, but there is something else. A string that connects it all, golden and bright and weaving itself into each crack and making it beautiful again. He feels as though he’s underwater, but he’s no longer treading it, nor is he sinking - he is following the current into the sea and feeling it’s turmoil. It’s darkness, it’s fear, it’s violence and loneliness. 

But there is more than that. There is life. There are people above and below and harmony in each crash of the waves. There is surrender, and love. The moon shines above and leads the waves and they trust that she will not lead them to their doom. The sailors look at the stars and trust that they will guide them home.  _ He  _ trusts that the stars will guide him home, and he can finally answer the question he had asked so long ago:  _ what does love feel like? _

Like everything else, Snoke - Palpatine - whoever - worked in half-truths and shadows.  _ Like fear _ , Snoke had said,  _ like how the tides fear the rocks and the rocks fear the tides, both locked in their inevitability _ . It is inevitable, he thinks now, but rather than fear, it feels warm, like he had imagined coming home would feel like, and he smiles and feels himself move - forwards, backwards, outwards, he doesn’t know which.  _ This, _ he thinks,  _ this is beautiful _ , and he thinks about all of this love that he carries in his chest in that moment, and he thinks to spare a bit. 

_ For who _ , something asks him, and it’s that small, tired, angry little voice that is no one’s but his own.

_ For you _ , he answers.  _ Because it should have been yours from the beginning _ .

And then he hears a chuckle, and it sounds like his father’s, or his uncle’s.

_ See you around, kid _ , Luke says from somewhere very far away, and then he feels one last great shove, and he falls onto solid, wet ground, a small pebble jutting into the soft part of his palms. 

When he opens his eyes, he is no longer on Luke’s island. This planet has a forest, and he seems to be in the center of it. He takes a step forward, and when he looks back, in the mud, there is a footprint. He takes another step, and leaves another footprint. Wherever he is, he is here. And so he does what anyone would do when given a second chance - he picks a direction and runs. 

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for sticking with me! This is definitely going to have a part two at some point in the future! Please please please interact with me: comments and engagement keep me motivated and help me know that I'm not just screaming into a void haha. Come say hi to me at imbellarosa.tumblr.com!


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